November/December 1995 Issue

A Guide to the Religious Right

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Paul Weyrich, the New Right’s strategic architect, founded the powerful Christian Coalition. He now runs the Free Congress Foundation. Richard Viguerie has raised millions for New Right causes and candidates with the most lucrative direct-mail operations this side of L.L. Bean. “Direct mail,” Viguerie says, “is like having a water moccaasin for a watchdog. Silent but deadly.”
Howard Phillips, with Weyrich and Viguerie, forms the New Right’s trinity. He founded the Conservative Caucus, helped start the Moral Majority, and now heads the U.S. Taxpayers Party, which hopes to draft Buchanan for president. Presidential Candidate Pat Buchanan‘s announcement of a “cultural war” ignited the religious right at the 1992 GOP convention. “Just wait until 1996,” he promised this year. “Then you’ll see a real right-wing tyrant.”

Illustrations By Mark Zingarelli

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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